Khan’s next fight likely to be on HBO on December 15th

By William Mackay: Amir Khan’s contract with HBO has run out as of his 4th round TKO loss to WBC light welterweight champion Danny Garcia last July. However, HBO is still interested in televising Khan’s next fight on December 15th on the network, according to RingTV.

Golden Boy Promotions CEO Richard Schaefer told RingTV “Amir Khan wants to fight on December 15th, we are currently having conversations with HBO about structured dates, money and opponents.”

Schaefer is trying to work out an extension for Khan, and not just a one-fight deal. However, HBO should be wary about signing Khan long-term following his back to back losses. What HBO doesn’t need is fighter that is on the brink of collapse with his career sinking into the mire with additional losses.

HBO also doesn’t need a fighter that has to be carefully matched, and you can make an argument right now that Khan probably needs to be matched very, very careful from here on out to avoid him getting knocked out again. I think it would be a real risk if HBO signs Khan for a four-fight deal and then steers him into fighting a slugger, only to see him get knocked cold.

HBO would then have three more fights on the Khan contract and they’re probably not about to let Khan fight nothing but softies over and over until his contract expires. Khan couldn’t even beat the light hitting Lamont Peterson, and was wilting under his pressure last December.

If HBO is going to sign Khan for more than one fight, then need to have some kind of escape clause that they can use if Khan gets knocked out in his next fight. That would be three losses in a row for Khan, and HBO can’t afford to have fighters like that as their house fighter. They need someone that they can count on with a degree of certainly to be able to win fights without needing to be maneuvered around certain types of fighters.

Khan is being mentioned as possibly fighting #1 WBA welterweight contender Diego Chaves next. It’s still not official and there’s a good chance that someone else will wind up facing Khan on December 15th instead of him. But if Chaves gets the fight, then he’ll have to melt down from 147 to make the fight at 140, and this could give Khan a good chance of winning because Chaves might be too weak to fight with the same kind of intensity that he’s known for. If the fight were held at 147, I’d say that Khan would be in deep, deep trouble because Chaves is like another Marcos Maidana. He hits hard and he’s an excellent pressure fighter. Like I said, dragging Chaves down to 140 might weaken him enough for Khan to win the fight.

Khan won’t last long if he’s forced to fight someone good on HBO with power. The only way I see Khan being able to get back to where he was before if he can face guys without much of a punch, speed or size that Khan can dominate.

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